Three Bodies Found as Arrests Are Made During Investigation of Missing Baja Surfers
Update, Friday 3:10 p.m. Pacific Standard Time (U.S.): According to a report in the Sydney Morning Herald posted Saturday morning in Australia, three bodies were found in northern Baja near the area where two Australian surfers and their American friend went missing. Two anonymous sources confirmed that Mexican authorities had located the bodies, which, as of yet, have not been confirmed as the three missing surfers. Authorities are still investigating. We will continue to update this story.
Mexican authorities have found evidence that may be related to the case of the three missing Baja surfers who vanished in northern Mexico on April 28. According to reports, three people have now been placed under arrest.
The trio consists of two Australian brothers, Jake and Callum Robinson, and their American friend, Jack Carter Rhoad. They were last seen on April 28, surfing near K38 on the northern end of the Baja Peninsula. They were scheduled to check into an Airbnb that day, but never arrived.
In the days following, family and friends of the missing men became alarmed when all contact ceased and the relatively frequent social media updates halted. The authorities were alerted, and ccording to local media reports, one of the missing men’s phones turned up near La Bocana. “A woman … about 25 years old … was detained in possession of it [in the upper part of Maneadero],” reporter Mario Muñoz told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. She was reportedly found with drugs in her possession as well as the phone, and was handed over to the state attorney general’s office.
Now, more evidence has been found. On the morning of May 2, authorities found abandoned tents that were possibly linked to the missing men. It is being reported that three people have been arrested and the surfers’ missing truck was located on a ranch south of the city of Ensenada. It had been lit on fire. “Police said the men they arrested were brothers,” ABC reported, “and one was in a romantic relationship with the detained woman.”
“A working team (of investigators) is at the site where they were last seen, where tents and other evidence was found that could be linked to these three people we have under investigation,” María Elena Andrade Ramírez, the state’s chief prosecutor, told reporters. “There is a lot of important information that we can’t make public. We do not know what condition they are in… all lines of investigation are open at this time. We cannot rule anything out until we find them.”
The amount of time that has passed since the men disappeared is concerning investigators.
“Unfortunately, it wasn’t until the last few days that they were reported missing,” Andrade Ramírez continued. “That meant that important hours or time was lost.”
The investigation is now including Mexican authorities, the FBI, and the Australian and U.S. consulates. The search for the missing men is still underway as of this writing. We’ll update this story as more information becomes available.
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